Catherine Atkinson:…

Derbyshire County Council has spent £1 million to pay off debts of schools who have moved into academy status. The money wasted on the academisation of schools serves to further exacerbate the huge underfunding of schools today.

The scandal of underfunding in our schools has led a group of local concerned parents, teachers and governors to form Save Our Schools East Midlands to fight for more money in classrooms supporting our youngsters. 320 Derbyshire schools still face Government cuts which is having a huge impact on our children’s futures. See link to the schoolcuts.org.uk website here

£2.8 bn will be cut from school budgets between 2015 – 2020
This represents an average of £45.4k cut to primary schools
And an average £185.2k cut to secondary schools.

SOS East Midlands is a local community group which is determined to reverse these cuts and get proper funding for our schools now. Cuts are already having an impact – whether this is job cuts taking Teaching Assistants away from children with special educational needs or cutting back course choices at A level for sixth-formers. In Derbyshire 83% of schools stand to lose funding.

Local SOS EM spokesperson Diane Fletcher said:
“Our children deserve better. Our children only get one chance to get through school – we need to make sure they get all that they need from their education and this is properly funded. We are calling on Parliament to stop the school funding cuts. We are also encouraging parents to visit the School Cuts website and find out how their children’s school is being affected. We are planning to take concerned parents to lobby politicians in October to put a stop to these cuts.”